Their importance became more evident when a strike kept many studios silent

Feb. 23, 2008

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Provided to the Reno Gazette-Journal

Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh in a scene from “No Country for Old Men.” The film is nominated for eight Oscars, including best picture. / AP/Reno Gazette-Journal

Oscar trivia

1. When and where did the first Academy Awards ceremony take place?

2 Joel and Ethan Coen are nominated for best adapted screenplay for "No Country for Old Men." When is the last time they were nominated in this category?

3 "No Country for Old Men" and "There Will be Blood" lead this year's Oscar contenders with eight nominations each. Should either film run the table, it would be a rare feat. In fact, only four films receiving five or more nominations have won in every category eligible. Name them.

4 Six of the 20 performers competing for acting awards this year already have an acting Oscar. Name them.

5 This year's race for best foreign language film features movies from Israel ("Beaufort"), Austria ("The Counterfeiters"), Poland ("Katyn"), Kazakhstan ("Mongol") and Russia ("12"). It does not have a contender from any of the five nations that are most-nominated in this category. Name them.

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The Writers Guild of America strike ended in time to bring the stars out for tonight's Oscar celebration, but just two weeks ago people were wondering if the movie industry's biggest night would be a bust. That's a tribute to the powerful role writers play in today's film industry.

True, writers don't have the high profiles of movie and television stars. Heck, they aren't as well known as famous directors -- think Martin Scorsese. But maybe, just maybe, the strike reminded people that screenwriters play a part in every film in the multiplex.

"Martin Scorsese doesn't exist without the script," said University of Nevada, Reno art and film professor Howard Rosenberg. "Now, he may have input into it, but without the guy or the gal "» who actually put it into a format that works all the way around, you ain't got anything."

Rosenberg said he believes people in the film industry will take writers more seriously now, and for good reason. Years ago, Rosenberg said, he talked to director Frank Capra ("It's a Wonderful Life," "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington") about his process, and Capra said he visualized stories as he read them.

"I said, 'Supposing there were no words,'" Rosenberg said. "(Capra) said, 'Then there is no image.'"

So, when Rosenberg looks at this year's Academy Award nominees, he sees not only great movies, but great screenplays. Oscar voters apparently agree, as the writers of all five best picture contenders -- "Atonement," "Juno," "Michael Clayton," "No Country for Old Men" and "There Will be Blood" -- are in the race for best screenplay.

"I think almost everybody admits that it's usually the writer's story that got things off the ground," said Robin Holabird, deputy director of the Nevada Film Office. "I feel five movies have strong screenplays this year."

One of those movies was written by Christopher Hampton, a British playwright, screenwriter and director who was nominated for "Atonement." He says writers don't receive the respect they deserve in Hollywood, but he advises fellow screenwriters to go in with eyes open.

"If you're wise, you always remember as a writer that it is a director's medium," Hampton said. "It is the director's film and the director has to attend to everything as well as the writing."

That said, Hampton thinks great films are usually born from writer-director partnerships.

"Of the really successful films I've worked on, I've had a very good relationship with the director and a consistent one that's gone all the way through," he said. "I think that is actually rather an important component of most successful films in the sense we're talking about. You know, most artistically coherent films."

That said, plenty of movies are released into U.S. theaters with the writers treated like castoffs.

"Particularly in Hollywood, there's a long tradition of screenplays being re-written by other hands all the way up to production," Hampton said. "I feel very fortunate that 'Atonement' is my 13th screenplay and all of those screenplays are more or less written by me. "» They more than approximately resemble the scripts that I wrote, and I think that is quite lucky in a way."

Thomas Lennon has seen the other side of the coin. He and his writing partner, Robert Ben Garant, are best known as co-creators of the popular Comedy Central television show "Reno 911!," but they also have written a number of films, including "Night at the Museum." Lennon said giving up creative control of a project is part of the game.

"You are going to get re-written by other people all the time," he said. "You're going to re-write them. It's really a cycle and it's a rather small community of writers that they keep going to.'"

Despite the merry-go-round re-writes he sometimes faces -- Lennon's and Garant's draft of "Night at the Museum 2" is now in another scribe's hands -- Lennon said there is joy in writing a screenplay.

"You do have to kind of get used to the fact that you are not a novelist," he said. "You're much closer to a contractor. You know, the studios have said, 'Make me a kitchen.' And the kitchen that you're making should have all of the elements that most kitchens have. "» Once you come to terms with writing in the studio system, it's actually quite fun."

As for tonight's Oscar celebration, writers may not light the red carpet the way their acting counterparts do, but they will get a moment to shine when screenplay honors are awarded. And guys like Howard Rosenberg will be paying attention.

"There seems to be a trend toward stories, real honest-to-goodness stories that really try to say something," Rosenberg said of this year's Oscar nominees. "It's sort of nice. I've been looking at them again and thinking about them. I haven't done that in a lot of years."